The Skylands Kings took advantages of Lockport penalties to emerge with an 8-5 victory Sunday afternoon at the Skylands Ice World in Stockholm, New Jersey. The Kings scored three goals with the man advantage, and took two out of three games over the weekend. The Express now trail the Kings by a single point in the Northeast Division.
Skylands opened up the scoring it would ended up being a very active first period of play. By the end of the period, 7 goals had been scored and 12 minutes in penalties assigned. Jan Broz netted the first tally at 5:26, on the power play. Craig Garrigan followed up at 8:01, to make it 2-0 for the home team.
Blake Bennett was able to get Lockport on the board with a power play goal at 9:12. He was assisted by Brandon Schweickert and Andrew Logar. The Kings responded at 12:21 with a powerplay marker by Clayton Thomas. The see-saw battle continued with Lockport’s Bennett scoring shorthanded two minutes later to close the gap to 3-2. Andrew Logar provided the lone assist.
Schweickert tied the game at 3-3 at 16:33 of the first, with Josh Evoy on the assist. The tied game was short-lived when the Kings were able to strike only 23 seconds later when Eric Vanderhoff put one in the net. The opening period would end with Skylands leading Lockport 4-3.
Vanderhoff was able to strike again early in the second period to stretch the lead to 5-3. Skylands bumped that lead to 6-3 off the stick of Broz at 5:17. Lockport’s Michael Sokol added to the Express scoreboard with his tally at 18:16. He was assisted by Aaron Shahin.
Lockport came into the third period ready to close the gap. Pavel Kovtunov buried a shot to bring the score to 6-5. It was the last time the Express would score for the afternoon. Skylands were able to pad their lead with two more goals late in the third. Craig Garrigan notched his second of the contest at 10:40, and Trevor Smolsky added the empty net insurance marker at 19:01.
“Undisciplined penalties cost us the game on Sunday,” said general manager and head coach, Frank Vecchio. Skylands was 3 for 5 with the man advantage, while Lockport was 2 for 4, and scored a shorthanded goal. Lockport outshot the Kings 60-41.
Lockport will next see action Friday evening in Rochester as they take on the Roc City Royals. The same two teams will face off Saturday evening in Lockport at the Cornerstone Ice Arena. Game time is set for 8:00pm. All home games can be heard LIVE on niagaraswatercooler.com
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